Andrew Perry

TH: Not only are you an airport administrator, but you're also a pilot. Which came first?
AP: Pilot's license. I actually went to school to be a corporate pilot and then somewhere down the road decided to do airport management instead.

TH: Did you have any aviation in your family background?
AP: Nope. We grew up in a sawmill and a timber business. Nobody flew. There was very little aviation background, actually, in the county that I grew up in. We had a grass strip close by, a few planes here and there, and that's really about the aviation experience that I had.

TH: So, how old were you when you thought, "Hey, maybe this flying would be something for me?"
AP: I did take a flight when I was probably about 5 years old. I remember the pilot let me fly it, take the yoke. It's a very vivid memory for me. And then the parents took us on a trip in early junior high and I remember just flying and just felt how awesome that was, being at 33,000 feet, looking down. It was at night. I couldn't get my head out of the window. Through high school, it just became more and more. Why? I don't know. But it's just one of those passions I guess that somebody gets through life. I took some ground school classes in high school to learn to fly. Then started my college career flying at Central Missouri State. Have never left it ever since. I hope I never do.

TH: From the get-go, you pursued aviation and started college (Central Missouri State) pursuing that. When did "corporate pilot" become "airport administration" for you?
AP: I got a little frustrated in school because it wasn't going fast enough. The year that I started, in 1989, was the highest freshman class they'd ever had. So I didn't start flying until later on in the semester. They had too many students, not enough instructors, so I kind of got frustrated with it. I started looking at other avenues. I ended up taking an internship toward my junior-senior in college. I looked at air traffic control and then I started reading airport business magazines. It was real interesting because I have a construction background. They deal with that. The more I started reading, so I looked for an internship and I found one in Cape Girardeau the year of the floods, '93. And I almost fell in love with it because I got to deal with construction and concrete and buildings and floods that year anyway. But I got to learn the political side of it. The political, they can't teach you that in college. We just did something different every single day. I just didn't get in an airplane and fly from here to there and back home. I followed it up with a graduate internship the following summer. The next thing I knew, I ended up running the airport for six months as an interim manager. That internship probably turned the tide total and I knew right then what I wanted to do and set my goals and off we went to the races.

TH: You're still a young man, but you were really a young man when you were interim manager.
AP: 23.

TH: A lot of responsibility.
AP: A lot of responsibilities, and I can truly say baptized by fire. I learned more in that six months than I could have learned in four years at college. The inner workings and how government works and department managers and the inside part of it that you just don't get that through a college education. We had other issues to deal with, as well. Probably the best six months I could have ever hoped for to start my career.

TH: After working in Terre Haute and then managing Garden City, Kan., how did it happen that you got this job?
AP: Well, Dubuque advertised. I researched into the airport and into the community. We grew up about 31/2 hours south of here. I applied for the position and had an interview and the next thing I know, they offered me the position. But three years out in Garden City, at least at that time, we started having kids and wanted to kind of move closer to home. And that's we'd done and Dubuque looked like a good opportunity and it's worked out very well. As a matter of fact, I've been here three years. We've loved every minute of it.

TH: Where did you grow up?
AP: Our hometown is Kahoka, Mo., but it's right by Keokuk. So we were right on the Iowa border.

TH: You and Danita are both from Kahoka?
AP: Yep. She's younger than I am but, yes, she's from Kahoka.

TH: Did you go together in high school?
AP: No. I knew her older sister. But we actually met in Kansas City when I finished up school and lived there. She was kind of going to school and we actually met at the Beaumont Club. We kind of knew each other, that was about it. We danced once, and then we danced into marriage by the time it was all said and done.

TH: So it was just a chance meeting there at the Beaumont Club?
AP: Yeah, it was. I was with the guys and she was with the girls. I heard somebody say, "Andy," and I turned around and it took me a minute and I said, "Hey." We just got to talking and dancing.

TH: And the rest is history.
AP: The rest is history, yeah.

TH: Does Danita work outside the home?
AP: Yes, she does.

TH: Where is she?
AP: Abeyance Salon and Spa.

TH: You are yourself a pilot, private pilot. Do you own a plane?
AP: No.

TH: How often do you get up? You have to lease a plane then?
AP: I'd have to rent one. Actually, I haven't flown too much in the last few years. Once I started having kids, the flying activities diminished. But I try to fly with some friends as much as I can, or if somebody asks to go up. I try not to pass up an opportunity to go flying, but no, no planes. I don't get to fly that much.

TH: It's an expensive hobby.
AP: Well, it depends on how you look at it. It's discretionary dollars from somebody's pocket, but you know, if you're big into computers, that can get expensive. Or snowmobiles or boats, so it just depends on how you look at it.

TH: I look at it as how deep I'd have to go into my wallet. You can be into several hundred dollars for an afternoon or a weekend.
AP: Yeah, you can. Yes. But you can also be from here to Denver, Colorado, in about four, five, six hours that you're not if you're driving. You're going to pay quite a bit for a commercial flight. You can fly back if you're flying around to see the scenery or for pleasure. It's absolutely wonderful. I love flying at night. It's calm and cool and clear. You can see everything. You can see the lights. Very enjoyable.

TH: What else do you like to do in your spare time if you're not flying?
AP: Kind of a craftsman. I like working with wood.

TH: I've see you got a carpentry background.
AP: Construction by trade. I used to build homes and pour concrete and do all that. I like to piddle. Right now, my hobbies are more of a 5- and a 2-year-old. Between hockey practice and day care and everything, so really enjoying the kids while they're young. I never got to play hockey when I was young, but I love the sport, so now I'm trying to learn it for him. The 2 year old, he's a 2 year old. Wonderful 2 year old.

TH: We talked briefly about what's ahead and you mentioned some of the other projects. What would you characterize as being the biggest challenges facing this particular operation? I mean, we know a lot about some of the challenges facing the airline industry overall, but given that's already on the table, what specifically would you say are challenges that are unique or unusual or special for this particular operation? Maybe I should ask, is there a distinction, maybe there isn't a distinction, maybe it's all the same, I wanted to focus in on this operation.
AP: I think the challenges are just trying to, well, let me back up, another one of your short answers here. We initiating an industrial park and we really haven't marketed that. We really haven't pushed it. I mean it's been talked about, there's paper on it, but it's good for the airport to get that going. So the challenge of that is, okay, we've got to get the word out. We have to let people know we're another option in town, on the south side of town, because it helps the airport for revenue stream. In my opinion, I think we're a little behind the eight ball a little bit of marketing ourselves more appropriately of what we are, and that's providing services and land to the community. Commercial service we market all the time. Now, it's time to step back and start marketing the airport in general as a transportation services out here for the different modes. That could be ground; that could be trucking; that could be warehousing; distribution; air cargo. So that's going to be a challenge lying ahead. I t'll take time to make that happen, to develop through the years. With that, as in all cases, is funding. Making stuff happen incrementally., judiciously, strategically and keep that going. So, funding is probably always going to be an issue on the size of our operation. Funding federally and on state. We're working with state funding. It is probably always going to be a challenge or an issue that we have to deal with. One of the challenges we have is we have so many regulations to deal with and when we building something, not necessarily a building out here, but anything air side, they have to meet very strict criteria, so deep, so wide, you name it, and all that costs money. We have to match it with a local share. So there again we're looking for more funding. But you want to keep growing because our community is growing. What I would prefer is try to stay ahead of that so we can not be behind the eight ball on providing those services to the community. So we definitely have some work ahead of us coming up , but I guess this is what I enjoy, is getting people behind this and having this airport grow, because it does funnel into the community. Our economic impact study was $50 million is what we send to the community. I would like to see that continually grow. Hopefully providing more jobs to our surrounding citizens, providing more services, making the airport more self-sustaining as far as revenue-wise. We have a $30 million asset out here. We need to be using it to the ultimate best of our abilities for this community. With that, there are going to be a lot hurdles and challenges. But I don't think I can narrow it down to any specific, one specific issue. The ultimate would probably be funding. That's always the largest issue.

TH: It's always money.
AP: It's always money, it really is.

TH: When you see some of those U of D flight students out here, do you sort of see a little Andy Perry in them? Are they a lot like you when you were their age?
AP: We do. Yes, I do. We try to get interns every semester from U of D. So there's another cooperative actually. We try to provide them with three different interns if they want them. One, airport management, specifically; one, operations, more of Todd's (Dalsing) side, my operation's director; and one that could be FBO. Because there's a lot of different aviation jobs out there a lot of students sometimes don't realize. Even in the college area. I didn't realize we had this many jobs until I started digging. So we offer internships, virtually as much as they want. It's free labor for us and they learn. So that' another cooperative that we like to work with. Yeah, I do. I see some, especially the ones that get into maybe that were like me, the like flying, they love it, but maybe there's something else for them and you can just kind of see. And I've seen some go down the road that's gotten jobs now and they call every once in awhile. It would be kind of neat to ask them 5, 10 years from now when they're in my position or wherever and just ask them how they felt. Been there, done that. I've talked to them about it, the interns, how I did it and whatever. It's kind of neat to watch. I like dealing with the students. I think they're wonderful. They're our next generation. I'm too old guy around anymore, it seems like. TH: Regarding emplanements and usage of the airport. Bottom line, there are more people using Dubuque Regional Airport than there were using it a year ago or two years ago?
AP: A year ago, yes. Now, we're still down from the 2000, 2001 and even '02 levels. But after about 2000, we start to see the drop. Then 2001, then you see it drop more significantly. At least we're starting to curve back up. That's typical. Most airports across the country had that, especially the Iowa airports.

TH: Effectively, Dubuque Regional Airport is in competition with Cedar Rapids, Moline, Madison for those air passengers. So, the Andy Perrys of Cedar Rapids and Madison or Moline are probably working with and lobbying their air carriers to try to cut the best fares for their particular airports. AP: Yeah, those airports are trying to work with their carriers, too, to keep them growing. It is a true competition out there. Cedar Rapids' competition is the Quad Cities and Des Moines. A little bit of us. Particularly, they go to larger airports, they don't come to smaller as far as leakage, but some of it does happen.